Technology improving fuel efficiency and reducing emissions

SINCE 2006 Kinetic Australia has been using aerospace-derived maintenance strategies in the construction, operation and maintenance of power stations following more than 25 years’ experience in the aerospace industry.

This approach has the benefit of increasing equipment availability and serviceability of assets and reducing unplanned maintenance and failures, which in turn allows for increased production. This reliability-centred maintenance strategy includes the use of various techniques to understand the state of the equipment in a power station and therefore allows for more informed decisions to be made regarding the timing of maintenance activities, which in turn optimises resources and spares around the need for maximised power generation or site production.

Having manned the 30MW Birla Nifty Power Station for the past seven years, Kinetic Australia has increased the availability of the mixture of gas turbines and reciprocating diesel generators has increased to over 99 per cent. Kinetic Australia has also had significant involvement in various power station projects including the construction of two GE LMS100s at Kwinana Power Station, two GE Frame 6Bs at the Merredin Peaking Project, two GE LM6000s at the Solomon Power Station and four GE TM2500s at the South Hedland Power Station.

Kinetic Australia has developed specialised equipment, Precision Oil, for the treatment of lubrication and control oils in gas turbines and generators and insulating oils in transformers. The ability of this equipment to remove moisture and dissolvable gases using a high-level vacuum, debris using state-of-the-art filter technology and other detrimental influences is extremely effective and highly beneficial to the life of the oil and its effect on the serviceability of the equipment. This leads to lower maintenance and increased equipment life. The additional benefit is the reduced cost of replacement oil and the eliminated need to shut down, as this process can be carried out with the equipment still running. The environmental advantages are huge given that there is less need to replace the old oil and then pay for someone to take it away for disposal. This all makes the use of these hydrocarbons just that bit more sustainable.

The fine filtration and moisture extraction from bulk-stored diesel fuels is carried out to extremely high standards using Kinetic Australia’s Precision Fuel systems. The use of the new filter technology combined with an efficient moisture extraction system, (which involves no moving parts), leads to an extremely clean fuel and, given today’s advanced technology diesel engines, allows for a more efficient use of fuel and reduced emissions.